Vernon Volumes

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Saturday, November 8, 2014

Daddy day - parks, picnic and zoo

Andrea is out of town this weekend with her tennis buddies for a girls' tennis weekend. I haven't had the kids with just me in a long time, so I didn't really have a lot of ideas on what to do with them today. I decided to just ask them what all they'd like to do. I threw out a few options and they said yes to all of them. So, we decided to just start doing stuff after we got up and see what all we could fit in to our day.

After breakfast we got the car packed and set off. We had a little time before Connor's soccer game and they said they wanted to go to a park, but they wanted to go to a new one. Since we had to stay near Veteran's field for Connor's soccer game that really didn't leave a lot of options. We drove through Aberdeen and found a little park off the road and decided we'd play there for a bit.

Paige wanted to go down near the pond to look at the birds and wanted to pose for a quick pic.

There wasn't a lot to play on, so after a little while they agreed we should head over to Veteran's field to play.

At Veteran's, Paige climbed to the very top of the rope course, so brave!

Soon it was time for Connor's game, so we got our chairs and enjoyed the nice weather for the game.

Connor didn't play a whole lot in the first half, but thankfully played a bit in the second half. Unfortunately their team lost 1-2.

After soccer, we let Chloe out and then headed off for our picnic. I stopped by Chick-fil-a for some sandwiches and the kids wanted to bring a random assortment of food from home. They wanted to go somewhere new, so I punched in "Park" to Google Maps and drove to the closest park. It turned out to be Losco park. The last time we went there was the last Daddy day, when Andrea went to Vegas in February (http://babyvernon.blogspot.com/2014/02/day-out-with-daddy.html). The kids loved the park and decided it'd be fun to go again so we found a nice spot under a pretty oak tree and had lunch.

After lunch, we played at the park for a long time.

We ran around and played for a while and finally the red swings, which are always popular, became free.

The kids love the red swings. I told the kids to just relax on them and I pushed them for a while and would tickle them if they fell asleep. They really enjoyed it. At the end of the day, I asked Paige what her favorite part of the entire day was and she said it was the "Relaxin' swings".

At around 3, I got the kids in the car and left for the zoo. It's getting darker earlier, so I knew we didn't have a ton of time there. On their website, and on Google Maps, it said they were open until 6 however they were actually only open until 5. We decided to go in anyways, and thankfully they only charged me for one adult admission. Probably because we only had an hour and a half before closing time.

In the reptile room, I decided to ask Connor to see if he could take a pic with me in it. He did a pretty good job!

Paige really really really wanted to try too, so Connor and I posed for her.

It kind of created a problem I didn't realize I'd have. Connor really wanted to take pics the rest of the day, I was more than happy to let him try, but it made me a little nervous since he was using my new camera.

Paige took another pic of Connor with the elephants.

There were some neat animal statues that were designed to climb on. The kids loved swinging on the elephant tails and balancing on the trunk.

We rode the carousel once. Connor picked the eagle, even after he was told that it didn't go up and down. It was just too cool to pass up.

Paige rode the dolphin.

Connor wanted to take a pic of me, so I jumped on with Paige. Only after I got on, I realized the picture spot wasn't designed with tall adults in mind.

A nice man passing by offered to take a pic of all of us, so I got another pic with the three of us in it.

We ran through some mazes and then went to a neat little bird themed park. The kids liked the slide and the climbing ropes.

They loved the little nest at the top of the park. After I took a pic of them relaxing on the egg, I pretended I was a bad dinosaur trying to eat it and they were the daddy and mommy birds. We fought and played for a bit until Paige elbowed me in the eye. It was getting a little too wild and crazy, so we decided to do something else for a bit.

At five, the zoo shut down and we were ready to go. We got home, cleaned up, and the kids went to bed without much of a fuss. They had a fun day, and were definitely worn out. We all missed Mommy today, but we still had fun together.